Debunking the "strasserite" smear

So, the neoliberals and SJWs have a new word! Now, any white male who is hardcore into social democracy like, say, Kyle Kulinski, or even myself, is now being called a "strasserite" by the woke crowd. The idea is that we are "class reductionists", because we don't go on and on nonstop about identity politics every 5 seconds, and because we focus more on class issues and economic issues, this is their new academic sounding word to smear us. Let's look at what "strasserism" is.

Oh, lovely, so they're literally calling us nazis now. Yep, strasserism is a form of nazism that tends to be more economically left, but seems to pin all of the problems with society on "t3h j00s". You know, because nazis are anti semites. Yikes, that doesn't sound like me. I'm just some white dude who wants basic income and universal healthcare. I don't see any reason to accuse people of literally being a nazi for now bowing to your circlejerk. This is why no one takes the woke left seriously. 

Look, I'm gonna be honest, the only reason I crap on the identity politics stuff...is literally because of stuff like this. I resent being called racist, sexist, anti semitic, nazi, etc. JUST for daring to put my economic interests above all other politics. Most social justice warriors fall into two camps. Either they're rich neoliberals who user that stuff as divide and conquer, or they're literal socialists and communists who use that stuff to purity test people. And the rich neoliberals LOVE to use these politics to badmouth anyone who dares emphasize economic issues over social ones. To be fair, I've seen some more socialist extremist type guy use this on me once as a purity test, but most of the time it's just some "woke" neolib shoving identity crap down my throat. Because they love to pit economic interests against class interests when no inherent contradiction exists, they just create one to maintain their power. Which ironically does create something similar to strasserites among some Trump supporters.

Speaking of which, if you want to compare Donald Trump to fascism, go right ahead. I mean the dude is an authoritarian strong man who  hates democracy and detains certain minorities in camps to concentrate them in one place *cough* while openly touting white supremacist dog whistles and appealing to people who are the equivalent of the modern day brown shirts. Yeah. Trump is fair game. Don't get me wrong. I call him stuff like Mango Mussolini all the time in my daily lexicon. Because that's what he is. Literally.

My problem is with bashing social democrats as nazis of some kind. Look, here's the thing. Despite my complaints about woke politics, I actually get the theory. I mean, I studied sociology in college as one of my majors. I'm familiar with privilege, gender critical theory, race critical theory, the sordid history of the underprivileged in our society. I actually get it. And I actually do think that those politics have a place on the left. I just don't believe they should dominate the left and come at the expense of class politics. And when neolibs cynically use that crap to bully me, well, it's on.

And I'm sure most economic progressives get that. We're not stupid. We're not some closet sexists and racists who secretly support trumpism. We just resent how the woke crowd uses identity politics to control people in a similar way christianity uses "sin." Where we constantly must apologize for being human and submit our entire being to some cause the person in power wants us to. That's literal brainwashing.

Anyone else feeling politically alone lately?

I'm gonna be honest, as of late, I feel politically homeless. I have felt this way since about 2015 when the democrats decided to go full centrist and push Hillary and neoliberalism on us, but I don't even fit in on the left any more.

It's quite clear I'm largely not a conservative. I abandoned them for a reason, I have no incentive to go back. My home is somewhere on the left. But at the same time, I don't feel welcome both among democrats and the left.

I don't fit into the democrats for obvious reason. They've completely abandoned the left for this weird suburban centrism thing. They claim to represent the left, claim to be progressive, but they offer the most watered down bullcrap policies possible. They take universal healthcare and turn it into some mediocre public option plan Biden proposes, and you know what? They likely won't even pass that, and we'll just get ACA 2.0 in practice. They dont offer student debt forgiveness full stop, they offer it to a handful of people and then want to knock off a few thousand dollars for others. I mean, they're a joke. They believe in incremental change, which amounts to the most mediocre solutions possible, whereas I want massive solutions. Medicare for all, UBI, free college, etc. Those three policies are what best represent my platform, and I've stood by that since 2015. Not that I'm not open to a green new deal. I just see it as an inferior policy that competes with my preferred ideas. I would actually compromise with the left to get something passed, especially given the threat of climate change. We can always walk it back and replace it with UBI later after the useful parts of the jobs program have run their course. 

The problem is this is mocked by the centrists. They think I am "unreasonable" and want purity, when in reality I just want good solutions, not watered down knock off ideas. And since the election, they've become increasingly hostile toward the left and are developing cult like attitudes defending Biden. Just as we just put up with four years of "Hillary got more votes" and Russiagate, now they're framing Biden as "he got the most votes of any president ever!". Yeah? So? That's how population growth works. And while 2020 did get insane turnout regardless, almost as many people actually supported Trump, with Trump easily breaking Obama's 2008 record by four million votes. The fact is, despite that record turnout, Biden grossly underperformed in the polls and barely lost. Both sides had a wave, Biden's just happened to be slightly bigger. And honestly, the election shouldn't have been that close. Of course, democrats just end up becoming insular and mocking Sanders supporters and the like, going on about how great Biden did in the primary (despite the democrats' finger being obviously on the scale, turnout being relatively low, and covid screwing everything up), and how he won in the general. Funny. I didn't see them doing that a few weeks ago when they were too busy CRAPPING THEIR PANTS at the idea of almost losing the election. Ah, the power of propaganda and narratives.

The fact is, I hate the democratic party. I despise it. It doesn't represent me. I mean it supports at best an extremely watered down version of what I'm for, but that's it. We're spoonfed BS and we're told to accept it or go without. We don't have any real control over the party, and the party is openly hostile to us and mocks us. I voted green again for a reason. It shouldn't be this hard to get the semblance of good policy out of a political party. I feel like the party is organized to be hostile to my interests and a firewall against real change. 

 At the same time, while there are a lot of people who recognize this, I'm starting to not fall in sync with them. I'm gonna be honest, I actually felt at home with the Sanders movement after 2016. They were angry, as were I. They understand the party is hostile to us, and that they don't want our policies. But over time, I feel like this group of people has...radicalized. Like, by 2019, I had some hard decisions to make. I had to decide whether to support Yang, who supported my core ideals almost to a T, or Bernie again. For most of 2019 I was for Yang, but then switched to Bernie around the end of 2019/beginning of 2020 because of Yang backing off of medicare for all over time, and Bernie having a seemingly stronger stance on the climate, which I recognize as an existential threat. Until COVID hit, I was perfectly willing to just let UBI go for now and get behind the green new deal. I wouldn't get everything I wanted out of a Bernie administration, but I'd get most of it and the UBI fight could wait for another day. 

But...the Bernie movement became hostile to the Yang movement. Many people within the Bernie movement, between 2016 and 2020, became full on, died in the wool, socialists. I've looked into socialism and I find some ideas with it interesting, like worker cooperatives and democratic control of workplaces, but I largely like a market based system, outside of a few industries with very obvious market failures like healthcare and education. To me, I'm not sold on command economies and never was. I don't want socialized everything. I just want to socialize a few industries under the same logic that we have socialized roads. Some things are better run and more efficient with the government in charge. But that doesn't mean I support some soviet style economy. 

The problem is, this causes friction between myself and the hardcore Bernie movement, who have actually gotten obnoxiously purity based, even more so than me. For many of these people, Bernie is the compromise, and while that's true to me too, they mean it in a way of being for full on socialism. I don't honestly believe socialism solves most ills. While ownership of resources is important, I don't see how my life would be a ton better if the government ran literally everything or even if we had market socialism with me working on a worker coop and subject to markets. I recognize flaws in markets, while understanding we can fix those flaws without doing away with them. I have an anti capitalist bend while still supporting some forms of "capitalism" (markets). 

That said I start flaunting my Yang and UBI support in front of these guys and they treat me like a neoliberal. They purity test UBI to insane amounts, claiming it would cause inflation and that it would destroy welfare (as if that's a bad thing, welfare to me what the ACA is to Bernie supporters). It's like, dude, I'm trying to help you guys. I wanna give you $1000 a month and free healthcare. But then when you go against Bernie on anything, they suddenly shift the goalposts to some crazy socialist idea of how the economy should work and I don't fit in that group either. 

Even worse, a lot of these hardcore Bernie people are so anti democratic party they start parroting a lot of anti science nonsense on COVID and start inadvertantly wrapping back around to agree with Trump, just to spite the democrats. I don't base my views on tribalism but on a core set of ideas that conform to reality as I see it, so I feel like I can recognize democrats are right on COVID stuff while still hating them. But some of them seem to hate the democrats so much they start opposing them no matter how they can, and in the process leaving reality. That bothers me too.

It's like there isn't a place for anti establishment progressives who aren't full on commies any more, or aren't so anti establishment they become full on anti intellectual and start agreeing with Trump. I hate both Trump and Biden. I hate democrats and republicans. I'm on the left but I'm ultimately an independent, and being an independent is hard because you're bound to tick someone off no matter what you say, because your views don't fit into any box of expectations people have from you.

And before you ask, why not just join the Yang Gang? Well, the Yang gang, while less offensive as of late and the closest thing to sanity I can find, are just as bad. It seems like movements like Bernie and Yang end up with the supporters throwing out all reason to form a cult of personality where everything the leader says is right. Yang gang people tend to oppose medicare for all and free college and the like for reasons I find stupid, and their views seem to simply be based on the fact that that's what Yang says. Yang people act like Yang's so smart that we should just defer our opinions to him because he has superior intelligence, and that just isn't true. Yang is a great candidate and someone in politics who I admire and respect, much like Bernie, but his fan base can be just as bad sometimes as the groups I mentioned. People don't understand that their heroes are imperfect and fallible and might not hold all the answers. Another thing that annoys me with the Yang gang is that because of the hostility of the Bernie people I mentioned, these guys have essentially abandoned anti establishment progressivism and have the naive ideas that they can work within the democratic party and the neoliberals and centrists, when I see that as a no go. Much like Bernie, I believe the establishment has it out for Yang, they just act nicer because he's not a threat. But Yang is not going to get very far given the democratic party machine is what it is and the Yang camp tries to be like the opposite of the Bernie camp and try to work with them despite it not working. It's frustrating. 

And I'm not even touching the SJW cult again here either. That's another one. I nominally agree with them in core ideology terms but as stated many times on here over the years I find their movement to be extremist and toxic.

I've had the same problem with political ideologies over time. I'm not quite a social democrat as I'm more anti capitalist and anti work, but I'm also not quite a socialist as my support for socialism is nominal at best and as I said I still like some aspects of markets. I'd say I'm closest to left libertarian but given that term's links with anarchism I don't really like it either and in my experience it causes a lot of misunderstandings as people don't see the word "left" there implying a totally different philosophy than right libertartianism. Still given UBI is, at its core, "left libertarian" in the sense that it seeks to free people from wage labor and leave them to be free to do what they want with their lives, it seems to be the best overall fit. Even in left libertarianism my ideas are sometimes tempered by pragmatism though. 

 I don't know. I feel extremely alone right now politically. I feel like people like me are an extreme minority and we end up getting crapped on by the main camps of the left for some reason. Neoliberals think I'm a commie, commies think I'm a neoliberal, the Bernie camp thinks I'm a traitor but I don't fit in with the Yang gang either. I just want what I want and my views have been fairly stable since, say 2014 or so. Back then I felt like I fit into the party and was optimistic for a progressive future, but now the neolibs are pushing the party realignment along my worst timeline scenario of abandoning the rust belt to win the sun belt, with Trumpism filling in the gap, despite me being completely opposed to that while somewhat understanding it at the same time. The vast majority of anti establishment progressives are becoming increasingly tribalistic and socialist where I don't fit into them either, and I just don't feel I fit in everywhere. It feels tough to be...whatever I am these days. I just felt like I had to say something about it. 

So what the heck just happened?

 So, it's been a rough week, and I haven't really updated this blog on the election results. Honestly, I've been saying it all along, this is not 2016. Biden is WAY ahead, it was razor thin and in 2016 Trump overperformed. Biden was performing way ahead of Hillary in the polls. 

I was pretty confident going into election day that this would be an easy Biden win. I mean, he was 5-8 points ahead in the rust belt, he was 1-3 ahead in lots of southern "sun belt" states, it looked like a blowout. I expected it to be over quickly. Florida would come in, it was one of the early states to watch for...and it went red. Oh well, North Carolina's another state that looked like it would be good for Biden....and it went red. And then Georgia seemed red. And it looked like 2016 was unfolding again. I knew there would be a red mirage in the north before mail in ballots would be counted, but I honestly thought the south would carry it early. Trump's path of victory was narrow. If Biden could just take a few crucial states, it would be over before it started. I didn't want this to rely on the rust belt. And for a while there, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania looked awfully red. This was a nail biter.

Here we are a week later, and despite the orange moron throwing a tantrum, it's common knowledge Trump lost. But this election...scares me. I mean, it never should've been this close. The fact that Trump actually gained votes over 2016, even with higher turnout, scares me. And the fact that Biden underperformed like this, scares me. I cannot emphasize this enough. I'm SCARED. Legitimately afraid for the future of the country. Let's unpack what happened. 

So, as we know, I predicted Biden to win by 351-187.  Not only that, but I expected the leads to be very solid. Especially up north. PA ahead by almost 5%, Michigan and Wisconsin by 8+. I had those two as SOLID BLUE. As in, then going red would be outside of my 95% confidence range (which is actually 97.7% in a one tailed result like here). Instead, we basically are getting Biden 306-232.

The electoral college count was not far off. Well within the margin of error. My 95% confidence had Biden getting anywhere in between 242 and 438 electoral votes with 351 being the median prediction. You can see that demonstrated here. On a bell curve, I had Trump only having a 11.5% chance of winning, and this was at the 24th percentile or so. So an underperformance by Biden, but not a huge one. 

No. The electoral college results I'm happy with. It's the margins that scare me. Look at the map I posted, or look up the results yourself. The rust belt got eviscerated. Biden lost Iowa and Ohio by 8 points. He barely carried wisconsin and pennsylvania. Michigan is only up by 2-3 or so. The polls were off massively. In the south the polls werent quite as skewed, but it still came down to days of counting in Nevada, Arizona, and Georgia, all of which went to Biden by MUCH narrower margins than they should have. Not even getting into Pennsylvania. Here's a chart of the polling error relative to my predictions.

It should've never been this close. The polls predicted a decisive win, and this was an extremely narrow win. Biden did to Trump what Trump did to Hillary. Win by a handful of votes in a handful of states. As we can see, there was a systematic polling error in Trump's favor. Ignore Alaska, Montana, Missouri. They arguably shouldn't have been included in my analyses. Focus on the rust belt. Wisconsin was off by almost 8. Ohio and Iowa were off by 7. Most of this was within my 95% confidence, but when you're off by almost 8, you're at the outer bounds of that confidence.

That's why this election was so scary. Trump didn't overperform too too much in the electoral college. I mean, I only got 2.5 states wrong (Florida, North Carolina, ME2) and I will stand by my predictions based on the data at the time. It's the amounts that Trump overperformed on a state level. If Biden wasn't absolutely crushing Trump in the polls, Trump would've won again. He almost did. 

Down ballot races were even worse. In the senate, we lost Iowa, not a huge deal. We lost North Carolina again. We lost freaking MAINE. How the heck did we lose MAINE?! I had Gideon up 5 points with a 89% chance of winning. Right now, the fate of the senate depends on two runoff races. I got the special elections wrong in Georgia, I thought it was going to be ranked choice voting but instead it was runoff voting. Perdue managed to narrowly avoid 50% causing him to go to a runoff election, and the other special election will go as planned. Democrats' best case scenario is a 50-50 senate with both. Otherwise Mitch McConnell is gonna stonewall Biden on everything. And honestly, I don't like it when the fate of the country depends on Georgia. Biden won by 0.2% there. I really question if the special election will pull it off. 

Folks. This is the best the democrats could do. We have an orange dictator in the white house, and we barely beat him. I'm not surprised the sun belt went as it did, but the rust belt?! That scares me, and it does not bode well for the future of the country. People LIKE Trump. That's what scares me. I mean, Biden isnt great. I rip on him constantly. But at least he isn't Trump. Which isn't enough for ME to vote for him, but I'm also apparently 0.2% of the country. The fact is, 71 million people, 9 million more than last time, voted for the orange moron. After all those covid deaths. After him gassing protesters to do a photo op with a Bible. After him kidnapping American citizens off the street in unmarked vans. People. LIKE. Trump. This wasn't a low turnout election. In 2016, you could argue Trump won because of malaise. The people didn't like Hillary, Hillary only got 65 million votes. Trump got 62 million in the right places, it was a fluke. That's what I thought. 

This time Trump got 71 million votes. And Biden broke records. Biden didn't narrowly win because democrats underperformed. Democrats had record turnout. The problem is, so did the republicans. And they turned out for Trump and the GOP. That. Scares. Me. 

If we were up against anyone else but Trump, with his toxicity and incompetence, we would've gotten destroyed. And here's my fear. I've talked a lot about party realignments on here. Wanting to shift the country left ideologically. What if Trumpism IS the party realignment? What if the democrats only hope, as the rust belt shifts red, is the democrats pursuing centrism for another generation? What if Hillary blew it not only for 2016, but set in motion a line of events that are leading to the rise of fascism being popular in this country? What if this is just a 4 year reprieve before we get another Trump? Guys? I'm scared.

On the flip side, it's hard to say. I know a lot of democrats are screaming the "far left" like me cost the democrats the election, but honestly? Progressive POLICY seems popular. I mean, Florida simultaneously voted for Trump and raising the minimum wage. Several states voted for legalize marijuana. Nebraska voted to reign in payday loans. Heck it's only in the most traditionally liberal areas like California that conservative measures passed. And, perhaps the most damning thing of all for centrists, virtually all vulnerable lawmakers who supported medicare for all kept their jobs, whereas the more moderate candidates lost. Perhaps centrism really is the problem. The democrats sure did work hard to get that Kasich vote, and I found it alienating as heck. Maybe people do want change, but Trump sometimes seems more willing to offer solutions to every day problems than democrats. A horrible, horrible judgment call, given how regressive the right is, but that could just be how bad democrats suck at messaging.

I don't know. All I know is that while I am not really looking forward to a Biden administration, I am looking forward to getting the crapstain out of office.

And I hope progressives do actually hold Biden's feet to the fire. I mean, I don't want America to go to sleep again and ignore solutions. I want Biden to at least pass SOME decent measures. Even if it isn't everything I want I hope we can push him to the left and avoid the tone policers who insist centrism wins elections, because if I learned anything from this, it really really doesn't. 

This was 2014 again. Pennsylvania votes out a crazy republican, and republicans win down ballot races across the country. I hope in 2024 we can actually get a decent candidate to bring solutions to the country. Maybe Andrew Yang or Nina Turner. I sure as heck don't want Kamala Harris or Donald Trump Jr.

Election update 11/2-3 (FINAL)

 So we're at the end of another long, and in my left wing opinion, disappointing campaign season. Seriously, we had 20+ candidates, including people for medicare for all and basic income and this is the best we could do? But I'm not here to rant and rave about how much I hate both candidates and how I voted green again, I'm here to just bring you the electoral math (to be fair Biden is the lesser evil though). That said, here's how this is going to work. I'll post the charts, change the info to remove the aforementioned bad pollsters (ie, trafalgar and the two associated with the center of american greatness, these guys are bombing the polling averages to make Trump look better), and I'll post my thoughts about each swing state and what I think will happen. Then I will do something similar for the senate. I will be updating this final chart as the day goes on and new polls come in, and finalize it tomorrow before the polls close. That said, let's get into it.

 2 way: Biden +6.5%

4 way:  Biden +7.2%

Hmm, so Biden has taken a last minute hit. Still, he's ahead of where Hillary was on election day in 2016. 

States	Winner/Margin	Z score	% D Win	% R Win	EV D win	EV R win
Michigan	Biden +8.6%	-2.150	98.4%	1.6%	232	322
Wisconsin	Biden +8.3%	-2.075	98.1%	1.9%	242	306
Minnesota	Biden +5.0%	-1.250	89.4%	10.6%	252	296
Pennsylvania	Biden +4.8%	-1.200	88.5%	11.5%	272	286
Nevada	Biden +4.0%	-1.000	84.1%	15.9%	278	266
Maine CD2	Biden +3.7%	-0.925	82.3%	17.7%	279	260
Nebraska CD2	Biden +3.0%	-0.750	77.3%	22.7%	280	259
Florida	Biden +2.8%	-0.700	75.8%	24.2%	309	258
Arizona	Biden +1.5%	-0.375	64.7%	35.3%	320	229
North Carolina	Biden +1.0%	-0.250	59.9%	40.1%	335	218
Georgia	Biden +0.3%	-0.075	53.0%	47.0%	351	203
Ohio	Trump +0.5%	+0.125	45.0%	55.0%	369	187
Texas	Trump +1.2%	+0.300	38.2%	61.8%	407	169
Iowa	Trump +1.3%	+0.325	37.3%	62.7%	413	131
Alaska	Trump +6.0%	+1.500	6.7%	93.3%	416	125
South Carolina	Trump +7.5%	+1.875	3.0%	97.0%	425	122
Missouri	Trump +7.5%	+1.875	3.0%	97.0%	435	113
Montana	Trump +8.0%	+2.000	2.3%	97.7%	438	103

Chance of Biden winning: 88.5%

Chance of Trump winning: 11.5%

Tipping point: Pennsylvania at 4.8%

Most likely outcome: Biden 351-187

To go into each state:

Michigan: This is a solid blowout for Biden. I admit I had to change the data a bit here, not only removing pro Trump groups from poll bombing the average, but also adding another CNN poll back in which was removed for some reason despite being equally recent as the ones included. It was Biden +12. So it shifted it heavily toward Biden. I'm extremely confident this will go Biden.

Wisconsin: Ditto for Michigan. Solid state for Biden. Despite shifting 7.4% in 2016, I don't think that will happen this time and polling is extremely bullish for Biden here.

 Minnesota: Not polled very often, but the two most recent polls that aren't trafalgar are +5. This is partially because of lack of polling but it could also be lack of campaigning. Hopefully Minnesota won't feel ignored and go hard Trump like Wisconsin did in 2016, Minnesota almost turned red, but barely held on. I would expect it to do so this election too, by the way.

Pennsylvania: The dedicated tipping point state, not only in most of my forecasts, but everyone else's too. Trump NEEDS PA to win. He needs to sweep the board in the south, and THEN take PA to win. Or another rust belt state. But PA is seem as the weakest one. We have a ton of data on this state and other than the poll bombers, it's very strongly pro Biden. I think Trump is locked out of the electoral college honestly, although any path to victory requires taking PA or another similarly strong or stronger rust belt state.

Nevada: This went for Hillary in 2016, and the polls are all very strongly Biden. Weaker than the rust belt, but still respectable and pretty much a lock for Biden in my opinion.

ME2: Maine's second district went Trump in 2016 narrowly, but polls show it as having a solid 3-4 point lead there. There was an outlier Trump +8 discussed in a previous forecast, but that's old data and an extreme outlier. I'm guessing it will go Biden. 

NE2: Never thought I'd see the day Nebraska would be up for grabs. Even if it is a small part. Polling is scarce here but the one recent poll I could find is Biden +3. And older ones had him up 6-7. So it's likely going Biden.

Florida: This is where we start getting into the tricky states. This state, and the next 6, are the ones that are the most competitive this election cycle. They are also the hardest to predict. This one is relatively easy. It's been fairly consistently pro Biden for most of the election cycle and while recent polls had it close to going for Trump, once the Trafalgar effect was removed we can see a trend that has it going Biden by a decent margin.

Arizona: Arizona is a weird state. Traditionally conservative, it's one of the neoliberal darlings for the whole Sun Belt strategy the democrats insist on trying. It's been going blue since Trump got in and John McCain died. Still a conservative state, it's hard to predict. Still, it's been largely pro Biden for most of the cycle and while it has narrowed in the final days of the campaign, I still expect a Biden win here.

North Carolina: This is another hard to predict state. It's nominally pro Trump by 0.6% on RCP right now, but part of that is due to poll bombing. Removing those polls gives it an extremely narrow Biden lead. This state has narrowed significantly in the last days of the campaign. It COULD go Trump. But I personally think it's going to go Biden. It only appears to be pro Trump because of poll bombers and relatively recent favorable Biden polls being excluded for some reason. Biden has a lot more strength here than current averages on RCP seem to indicate.

Georgia: Okay, here we come to the REALLY hard ones. I'd argue that Georgia and Ohio are going to be the hardest to nail down this election cycle. Removing the Trafalgar effect, it seems to go very narrowly for Biden. Like 0.25%. That's nothing. I mean, it might as well be tied. Still, data is data and I'm going to call it for the democrats. I really have serious doubts it will go blue, I mean, the GOP is infamous for voter suppression here and we saw this same story in 2018, but I'm a data driven guy so I'm calling it for Biden.

Ohio: Polling is weird here too. It's nominally Trump +1.4%, but removing the Trafalgar effect brings it down to 0.5%. Still, recent polling, while mixed, does seem to have a redward trend to it. It could go either way, but I'm giving this one to Trump. 

Texas: Texas is the one really big state conservatives have held onto. Democrats have California and New York, republicans have Texas. And given the state of 2020, this is another state the neolibs are targetting in their sun belt strategy. However, normally a pretty red state, it's always out of reach for democrats. I expect that to remain the case this year. I don't think the democrats will win here. It's close, and they could win, and seeing almost a 40% chance for a democrat to win Texas is a concern for the future of the GOP, but polling is polling, and despite it narrowing and being competitive, I expect the GOP to keep it. 

Iowa: This is the one really swingey swing state that seems to be making a clean break for Trump as the last days of the race close. I think that this is very likely going to Trump. I just hope this doesn't mean bad things for its neighbors like Minnesota and Wisconsin, that whole region seemed to trend the same way in 2016...

Alaska, South Carolina, Missouri, Montana: Merely included for statistical purposes given the margins are less than 8 and in theory democrats could win here. However, the odds of it are very low, and should not be taken seriously.

All in all, this looks like it's going to be a blowout for Biden. Anyone fearing a 2016 scenario should read what I wrote in 2016 on election day. I had a 56% chance Clinton would win, and a 44% chance Trump would, with New Hampshire being the deciding state and a 272-266 likely outcome. The polling margins and electoral map are far more favorable for Biden this time. I do think there is a lot of uncertainty in the outcome, but mostly along the lines of how big a Biden win it will be. An overperformance for Biden leads to a 400+ electoral blowout as Biden takes Texas and Iowa, sweeping the entire map of swing states that are realistic to take. A swing toward Trump would mean a more narrow win, with Trump keeping southern states like North Carolina, Florida, and Arizona, and Biden only having a 280 or so electoral vote win. The path to a Trump 270 becomes increasingly more difficult, as Trump will need to sweep all those states and then manage to blow a hole in the rust belt somewhere, most notably Pennsylvania, which everyone is worried about, or alternatively Minnesota, which seems a bit weaker than everyone thinks it is. It's still strong, but if I had to guess a Trump surprise win at this point it wouldn't come from Pennsylvania where democrats have their guards up, but Minnesota, where it seems to be taken for granted as a blue state. Regardless, either outcome is very improbable with only a roughly 11% chance of happening. Meanwhile there's almost a 40% chance of the Biden takes Texas and sweeps the map blowout scenario. Realistically speaking though, I think a 351-187 outcome is most likely to happen. However I have serious doubts about Georgia and could see a 335-203 outcome happening. I mean, it's GEORGIA. It's a red state going blue by a thread. Either way though, I think anything between a 280-413 electoral win for Biden is well within the realm of possibility. We're really just debating the margins of victory here at this point.

Senate forecast

States	Winner/Margin	Z score	% D Win	% R Win	Seats D win	Seats R win
Arizona	Kelly +5.7%	-1.425	92.3%	7.7%	46	55
Michigan	Peters +5.4%	-1.350	91.1%	8.9%	47	54
Minnesota	Smith +5.0%	-1.250	89.4%	10.6%	48	53
Maine	Gideon +5.0%	-1.250	89.4%	10.6%	49	52
North Carolina	Cunningham +2.6%	-0.650	74.2%	25.8%	50	51
Georgia 1	Ossoff +0.7%	-0.175	56.9%	43.1%	51	50
Iowa	Ernst +0.7%	+0.175	56.9%	43.1%	52	49
Montana	Daines +1.0%	+0.250	40.1%	59.8%	53	48
Georgia 2	GOP +2.6%*	+0.650	25.8%	74.2%	54	47
Kansas	Marshall +4.0%	+1.000	15.9%	84.1%	55	46
South Carolina	Graham +4.5%	+1.125	13.0%	87.0%	56	45
Texas	Cornyn +7.5%	+1.875	3.0%	97.0%	57	44

Chance of democratic control: 56.9%

Chance of republican control: 25.8%

Chance of a 50-50 split: 17.3%

Most likely outcome: 51-49 DEM

To go into each state:

Arizona, Michigan, Minnesota, Maine: Not much to say here, all strong democratic leaning seats that will bring the democrats up to at least 49 seats. Whatever else happens, I think the hard limit for the GOP this time is 51 seats.

North Carolina: This has been a fairly contentious race and it has narrowed a lot in the last days. While Cunningham is favored to win and this will bring the senate up to a 50-50 split, there is an almost 30% chance the republicans will win here and thus control the senate. Not the most likely outcome, but the same rough outcome as Pennsylvania going for Trump in 2016, to put it into context.

Georgia 1: While Ossoff is slightly favored to win, Perdue has been the long time favorite here and this shift toward Ossoff is very recent. Moreover, it's by less than a point. I have doubts that the democrats can win here, but it's possible and even slightly favored. Data is data.

 Iowa: This has been in the democratic camp until recently, but much like on the electoral college level, Iowa is going hard red as of late, and the democrats are no longer favored to win here. Which puts their control of the senate into question. Democrats can win either here, or in Georgia, to take the senate, the real question is...will they? And I have my doubts. 

Montana: I have no idea what's going on here. It's surprising Montana is within realistic reach for the democrats, but it is. Still, I expect this to go GOP. 

Georgia 2: This is that open senate seat up for election with ranked choice voting. Polling favors the GOP, especially once libertarian votes (libertarians lean GOP and I'd expect most of them to vote republican before democrat) are counted as GOP votes. Still, the democrats can win here. I really have no idea what's going to happen.

Kansas, South Carolina, Texas: While there was some controversy over Lindsey Graham earlier this year, polls are clear that he's favored to win there. I expect all three of these seats to go conservative, meaning the upper realistic limit of democratic control of the senate is 54 seats.  

And there you have it. Ultimately, the democrats are favored to win the senate, but the result is far less of a lock than Biden's electoral college chances. I would expect at least a 50-50 split, perhaps a 51-49 democratic victory, but at the same time, anything between 49-53 seats for the democrats is realistic. Who knows what will happen?

House forecast

I'm just going to copy and paste what I wrote the other day.

I always wanted to do a house forecast but lacked the data. There are too many races to keep track of, and many don't have polls. However, I thought of a workaround. I only need FOUR democratic leaning seats to calculate the probability of republican/democratic control of the house, because of the 39 swing districts, the democrats only need to win 4 of them to win the house. So what can I find?

IA1: Dem 10.0%

IA2: Dem 9.0%

IA3: Dem 11.0%

NY22: Dem +9.0% 

Yeah, that didn't take long. 4 "swing" districts all above 8 points. Weakest one being 9 points. That's a 2.25 Z score, which means:

Chance of democratic control: 98.8%

Chance of republican control: 1.2%

Yeah, democrats are winning the house, it's pretty much statistically significant. 

 Conclusion

Well, there you have it. I am fully confident (99%) that the democrats will take the house, very confident (89%) of them winning the presidency, but far less certain (57%) over the fate of the senate. It will be interesting to watch.  

https://www.270towin.com/maps/QnXNy